Monday, September 1, 2008

Welcome to Wildflowers

Welcome to Wildflowers – founded in 2003 as a website/resource now turned blog for women formerly, or currently, married to homosexual men – dedicated to sharing and acknowledging one another’s journeys, pain, anger and disillusionment while reaching for understanding, enlightenment and peace. We are committed to the healing, growth and education of ourselves, our children, our families, and our communities.

Wildflower women come from all walks of life. We have different educational, social and religious backgrounds. Whether we have a PhD or are a high school drop out, are Jewish, Christian, Catholic, Mormon, Buddhist, Atheist or worship the Moon Goddess of chocolate and sushi – we are all human, we are all women and, once upon a time, we all married homosexual men.

How many of us actually grew up dreaming of marrying a gay man? We think it’s pretty safe to say not one. None of us ever imagined as young girls, or teenagers, that our Prince Charming would actually prefer to wear the glass slipper himself. We all started out with hopes and dreams that were eventually either dashed or enormously dimmed. Now we are left with emotions that, at times, feel far too much to handle and hundreds of questions that have no easy answers.

How do we address the things we have always been taught about the nature of homosexuality now that it has so tremendously affected us personally – not to mention our families and marriages? Is the man we once loved, and may still love, now the enemy because of his orientation? Can it actually be repaired and healed like so many of us have been taught and, what’s more, should it be? Did he / we just not try hard enough, have the right therapy, or enough faith? What do we tell our children? Will he be a bad influence on them? Is it better to keep the kids away from a gay man – even though he is their father? Do we really have to forgive him? How do we even begin to work through the pain, anger and humiliation we feel about all the deception and infidelity? Many of our husbands gave us sexually transmitted diseases – some cleared up, some will always be a part of our existence and some of us are living with the life threatening HIV / AIDS virus. Some of us still have the psychological, emotional, or religious framework we started out with while many of us are struggling with enormous frustration over the often unsatisfactory and oversimplified answers we have been given and are undergoing massive, difficult and sometimes frightening personal make-overs. It’s all completely overwhelming and vastly complex. No woman should have to face these challenges on her own.

Now no woman has to.

The purpose of this blog is to reach out, to educate, communicate and share our experiences. To put women in touch with women and to provide a safe place to express, grieve, and heal - a place where we can awaken and revive our slumbering souls. John Bradshaw said, "When we hear others' stories, they connect us with something larger. They connect us to our archetypal depths... All of our stories tell of a hero / heroine, a divine child who was exiled and who is on a journey to find his or her true self." Remember what it was like to feel pretty, wanted, strong, vibrant and completely alive? Remember as little girls the joy we felt having crushes, playing in the rain, having pillow fights, making dandelion bouquets, giggling with girlfriends and eating ice cream cones without once worrying how it was going to affect our thighs? Remember who we were and what life was like before HIS SEXUALITY eclipsed everything?

Regardless of whether we are divorced or still trying to make our marriages work, we all must reclaim who we are and what it is we want out of life. We are each of us a phoenix rising from the ashes and it is time to soar. Time to breathe in the fresh air, feel the sunshine, laugh, cry, dream and eat some chocolate. It is time to fall in love with our selves. Time to celebrate being women. It is time to be wild.

“…The word “wild” here is not used in it’s modern pejorative sense, meaning out of control, but in it’s original sense, which means to live a natural life, one in which the creature has innate integrity and healthy boundaries. These words, wild and woman, cause women to remember who they are and what they are about. They create a metaphor to describe the force which funds all females. They personify a force that women cannot live without.”

No comments:

About Us...

This blog began in 2008, born of the brilliance of Emily Pearson, an evolution of her website which was founded in 2003.Recently, after the publishing of her book Dancing With Crazy, she passed the blogging torch to me.

I'm Kristine, serious grad student in relentless pursuit of understanding the straight spouse experience and how the world makes sense of mixed-orientation marriage. My own journey as a straight spouse contributes to my hopeful expressions, but when all is said and done, this is for you ladies -- past, present, and future -- who beautifully and courageously navigate your own experience of the brutally unique. Here, together, we can find understanding and safety in the simple blessing that there really are others who "get it".

Em and I discussed beginning the blog anew, with all new posts, a new mission, new thought... but I realized this blog is representative of our journey from wherever we began to wherever we are now, hopefully on a path to healing. I've edited some content, but kept most. I could not delete any past posts with comments from readers. Some of them have simply been reverted to drafts, perhaps to be reposted later. As blog posts continue and take on a new flavor, it will be symbolic of our evolution. Symbolic of our nature as wildflowers.

We began (and continue) with this simple purpose:

"Wildflowers is a blog that exists to support and celebrate the beauty, strength, courage and rebirth of women who have been, or who are currently, married to homosexual men." - Emily Pearson

On Stories...

"When we hear others' stories, they connect us with something larger. They connect us to our archetypal depths... All of our stories tell of a hero/heroine, a divine child who was exiled and who is on a journey to find his or her true self." – John Bradshaw

"For listening to the stories of others ... is a kind of water that breaks the fever of our isolation. If we listen closely enough, we are soothed into remembering our common name." - Mark Nepo